Kyle Busch wins Sprint Cup race at RIR with a late pass of Jeff Gordon

Sprint Cup at RIR

May 02, 2010|By By Marty O'Brien | | 247-4963

RICHMOND —

Kyle Busch repeated as the winner of the Heath Calhoun 400 at Richmond International Raceway on Saturday, and added yet another layer of frustration to Jeff Gordon's 2010 Sprint Cup Series season in the process.

Gordon, winless in the past 39 races, dominated the second half of the 400-lap, 300-mile race on RIR's three-quarter-mile oval. But Busch, who had been even more dominant in the first half, made a huge run off of Turn 2 on the outside following a lap 395 restart to pass Gordon.

Busch led the final five laps to win for the first time this season and for the second time at RIR. Kevin Harvick finished third and moved ahead of 10th-place finisher Jimmie Johnson for the Cup points lead, while South Boston's Jeff Burton and Carl Edwards rounded out the top five.

"It was a character-building night," Busch said of leading 221 of the first 229 laps, falling back to fifth, then rallying for the win. "When we fell back to fifth, it felt like 15th.

"We kept our head down and kept digging. As far as all the things in the race car were going, we kept a handle on it."

The victory is Busch's first since Bristol last August. For Gordon, who has finished second eight times since winning at Texas in April 2009, his runner-up finish marked the fifth time he could have, and perhaps should have, won this season.

The late shootout between the two was set up by a series of three wrecks from between laps 368 and 390. Prior to that, the race had been remarkably clean, with only a one-car spin and two debris cautions marring the scoresheet in the first 367 laps.

Gordon led prior to the lap 395 restart, as he had for most of the previous 145 laps, and elected to start on the inside. He did not regret his choice because he had seen how fast Busch was on the bottom throughout the race.

"If I had started on the outside, he would've driven by me even faster than he did on the outside," Gordon said. "He was unbelievable on the restarts."

It was fitting that the late shootout came down to Busch and Gordon, who led 370 of the 400 laps between them.

Busch's dominance in leading the first 100 laps was so complete that he lapped 16 cars, Tony Stewart and Emporia's Elliott Sadler among them. Gordon ran second most of that time, but was more than three seconds behind Busch at 100 laps.

Gordon snatched the lead for four circuits when Busch pitted under green on lap 142. But Busch retook the lead when Gordon pitted on 146 and, before long, he increased his margin to almost eight seconds.

At one point in the first 150 laps, Busch had lapped all but 15 other cars. He continued to lead until losing the handling on his car, evident by the blue puffs of smoke that blew from it as he entered the turns.

Burton moved in front on lap 230 and led the way for 20 circuits before Gordon moved to the front. Gordon led by five seconds with 50 laps to go.

Gordon appeared to be headed to victory before the flurry of late restarts. Busch passed Harvick on the bottom for second place on the second of the late restarts, then got past Gordon for the victory on the outside of the final restart.

"It stinks not to win for (21 races), but it feels good to win here and now we've got to keep the momentum going," Busch said.